


First Snow

by mediocrityatbest



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:27:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21588370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mediocrityatbest/pseuds/mediocrityatbest
Summary: Virgil’s from southern Florida and he’s never been to a hell-state quite like this one before. Of course he’s never seen snow!
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Logic | Logan Sanders, Anxiety | Virgil Sanders & Morality | Patton Sanders
Comments: 7
Kudos: 49





	First Snow

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this written for literal months, but I didn't want to post it while it was summer, ya know? Anyway, I hate the snow and can only write good things about it when it's not happening.

Virgil hates the cold. He hates that it makes him shiver and he hates that it tends to mean less sunshine and he hates that it makes him wear layers and he hates that it ever gets below seventy degrees, because really, that’s just criminal.

However, what he hates the most about the cold, is snow.

“Hey, Virge! Look! Isn’t this your first snow!” Roman jumps excitedly onto Virgil’s back, and Virgil barely keeps his balance. This damn oaf can’t keep his hands to himself, but Virgil’s gotten used to it by now.

“Huh,” he says, entirely lackluster. And now that he’s thinking about it, it is. He’s lived in southern Florida his whole life and never seen a speck of snow. It looks kind of weird.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Roman asks in a way that tells Virgil he expects an exuberant yes. Virgil’s not sure he agrees. Sure, it looks kind of cool, but it’s fucking cold and got all over him on the walk inside and when it went in his eyes he thought he was going to die or go blind, at least. He’s not a fan.

He tells Roman as much.

“Oh, come on, Brad Pititful! Don’t be such a downer!” Roman exclaims. He waves one arm with way too much force at the window and Virgil stumbles sideways. “It turns the world into a clean canvas that is ours for the painting! What’s not to love?”

“Uh, it’s fucking freezing?” Virgil says again. He looks in complete bafflement to Patton, the other in their quartet who didn’t grow up here. He was actually born in Texas somewhere, and you could tell from how much darker his skin got every summer that he loved the sun. He’d had his first snow in this hell-state, too, though Virgil hadn’t been here yet.

“Language,” Patton chides. He shoots Virgil a tiny smile when he does because Virgil is the only person who’s ever heard Patton say fuck or shit or damn, and it was all in the same sentence and with lot of other, worse, words too.

Patton says cuss words are for special occasions. And it certainly was.

“I agree with Roman,” Patton says then, and he looks out the window like a kid on Christmas - an apt description here, as they had just been discussing Christmas presents. Virgil thinks he’s lost his mind, or that the world has gone crazy because there’s no way someone who didn’t grow up with this could like it. “I didn’t like it as much when I first got here,” he adds at the look that must surely be on Virgil’s face. “But after I got used to it? I loved it!” Patton vibrates slightly, and Virgil has a sinking feeling he’s not going to like whatever comes next. Patton only begins vibrating when he has an idea, and Virgil usually gets the short end of the stick in them, if only because he’s newest to the area.

“I really started to like it after we had a snowball fight!” For a moment, Virgil is shocked. He hadn’t expected Patton, of all people, to advocate for violence, and he envisions a fist fight between him and Princey, covered in snow and blood - would it stick to them or would they melt it with their body heat? Virgil doesn’t know and doesn’t want to find out.

But the misunderstanding only lasts a second because Virgil has seen Christmas movies before, and he immediately begins shaking his head. His head is still shaking as Roman jumps off his back and declares that Patton’s idea is brilliant and it’s a great way to seduce Virgil into loving snow - yes, that is the word he used and yes, Virgil is just as horrified by the idea of being seduced by snow as he is by existing with it.

Then, Logan comes into the room and Virgil sees a light. There’s no way on earth that Logan, serious, stoic, Logan “I find math fun” Abbott, will go for this.

“Logan! We’re going to have a snowball fight!” Patton cries from Virgil’s other side. “Do you want to come?”

“This is the first time Virgil has seen snow, correct?” Logan asks. He’s wearing at least two sweaters and a scarf and sipping coffee with steam rising out of the mug. Logan abhors being cold more than Virgil does despite the fact that he grew up here. Virgil will have an ally.

“Yeah,” Patton tells him, and Logan smiles, and Virgil has a feeling he’s dead.

“Well then, of course,” Logan says. “I do love a good snowball fight. My older brother and I used to have them every time it snowed.” Beneath the terrifying smile Logan wears, Virgil thinks he can sense genuine affection for snowball fights. Somehow, this does not afford him anymore comfort. There’s only one thing Logan does better than work, and that is something he enjoys. If he enjoys this, they’re most likely all going to die.

At least he’ll die among friends.

When they tell Virgil to put on his coat, he thinks he may have found a way out. He hasn’t bought one yet, and though he won’t say it, he was hoping that his general stubbornness and refusal to acknowledge the possibility of snow would stave off the reality until summer, when it would be back in the nineties because this hell-state couldn’t just choose one climate.

Unfortunately, Logan has an  _ extra coat _ in the back and, when questioned on why he has a second coat at work, smiles and tells Virgil you could just never know when you’d rush out of your house without one and need a back up. The coat, however, is in Virgil’s size. This would have been fine, except Logan is six inches taller and smiling like he’s cornered his prey.

Either the universe really hated Virgil, or his friends had planned this specifically to torture him. He is leaning toward the third option, which is:  **both** .

Virgil tries, one last and desperate time, to escape the fate that is barrelling toward him like a bull seeing red.

“Your coffee’s gonna get cold,” Virgil blurts, shifting the coat around himself. He’s never worn a real, winter coat before. He’s never needed too because, until college, Virgil hadn’t left his home state. It doesn’t matter, though. The coat is uncomfortable and puffy and it makes a terrible noise when the material rubs against itself. He can’t really move properly, and Virgil hates it. He can say with one hundred percent certainty that this coat is  _ horrible _ .

But so is everything else about this stupid fucking season, so he can’t say he’s surprised.

Virgil casts his best puppy eyes at Logan, something none of his friends are quite immune to. He knows he looks pitiful when he does it, which is why it’s a look he usually saves for getting unhealthy amounts of coffee after pulling an all-nighter or for Patton’s Dad Lectures™ when he finds out about Virgil’s all-nighters. It’s not a look to be used lightly.

Logan almost breaks, but Roman clears his throat and the win Virgil could almost touch is gone. Instead, Logan picks up the coffee, that is still steaming, and downs all of it in about three seconds. Virgil’s mouth hangs open as the cup is put back on the desk.

“I think you’ll find that it won’t.”

That is how, despite his best efforts, Virgil is standing outside in a field next to the theater he works at, shivering and glaring at his three friends.

Roman scoops up some snow and begins to mash it. “See? You just press it together and then roll it in your hands and - voila!” Roman holds up a ball of snow proudly. He leans down and gathers more snow and adds it onto the original ball. “More snow equals bigger balls,” he says, and Patton laughs and then Roman winks and Virgil hates him that much more.

Then, Roman throws it right at Virgil. It hits the arm of the coat and explodes, and Virgil stares from the white splotch now melting off his arm, to Roman, and then back.

“This is supposed to be fun?” He’s incredulous that this is a thing people do. Who found this weird shit on the ground and thought,  _ oh, you know what this would be great for? Throwing at other people for fun! _

“I promise, Virgil,” Logan says, and he might look a little more sincere but Virgil knows this was all a dirty trick to start, “this is fun once you give it a try. Though the snow can otherwise be a bit of a bother.”

“Excuse you!” Roman calls over. He looks like someone just offended his Grandmother. “Snow is always beautiful and amazing! Much like myself.”

“No, Roman. That is a rather generalized and presumptuous-” A snowball hits Logan in the chest and he stops mid-sentence. Logan, who tries to talk about things while jogging or who will start talking and will not stop, even to order food, unless you literally shake him back into the physical realm of existence, stops talking. He doesn’t finish his sentence, just stares at his chest.

There are only two things in the world that can stop Logan from talking: an insult to his friends, and, evidently, snow.

“Well, gurl, why don’t you just stop talking and hit him with some snow then.” There, standing in the doorway of the theater, is Remy. They’re wearing their usual leather jacket, and they march out the door followed by what must be every person who was on shift today. It’s immediately obvious to Virgil that he will be the only person who has never been involved in a snowball fight and who has no desire to be in one. But maybe with this many people, Virgil will be able to sneak away.

“Virgil, you’re on my team,” Logan says.

“Woah woah woah! Teams? Since when? Nobody told me anything about teams! I didn’t sign up for this!” But they ignore Virgil, and the stare down between Logan and Remy continues.

“Are you sure about that?” Remy asks, and pulls their sunglasses down. “Don’t you want him to be on the winning team for his first snowball fight?”

“He will be,” Logan replies. Virgil’s never seen Logan look this serious, even when they broke the main prop for a play the week before it opened and couldn’t fix it and had to find a suitable substitute. He wonders if perhaps this is going to be a real fight.

Then, Remy and Logan are choosing teams and this feels a little too much like high school gym class to be fun to Virgil, though he was never chosen first in high school. He’s sad to see Roman get chosen by Remy, if only because he used to play baseball and has considerable aim. Logan chooses Patton next, and Virgil has a suspicion that Logan is choosing based on who he’s friends with rather than who would be an advantage because Patton isn’t athletic at all and there are certainly more qualified people.

“You know,” Virgil hedges to Patton. He knows this is his last chance for escape. “I’m not really a team-player. I’m more of a sit-on-the-sidelines-and-watch sort of person. Sooo,” and he tries to walk away. Patton grabs his hand. Virgil knows it’s over.

“Come on, Virge! A little fun does you a lot of good! And you did say you wanted to learn more about the culture in different areas, right? Well, here’s a whole load of culture! Let’s get learning!” Then, he drags Virgil behind a table that’s covered in snow and has been in the field since last spring when Virgil arrived here. He notices other people also ducking behind random odds and ends like tires and tables and trees.

When the first snowball lands exactly where Virgil’s head would be if there wasn’t a table there, he flinches and instinctively peeks over the table to see - well, he doesn’t know. But another snowball immediately flies right by his head and Patton pulls him back to safety and then the snowballs are flying left and right. People get hit, and fall and pretend to die and Virgil only looks out one more time, almost getting pegged in the eye in the process, and it is mayhem. Plenty of people have braved the no man’s land between the two sides and are getting hit from every direction. It doesn’t slow them at all. They just keep throwing snowballs.

Logan is, surprisingly, one of the people who are out there without cover. He’s so fast that almost nobody hits him but he is taking the other team out like a sniper. Roman, who Virgil would’ve expected to be doing what Logan was doing, is crouched behind an overturned couch. Virgil can’t actually see him, but he can hear him dramatically crying out every three seconds when he gets hit.

Patton stays by Virgil the whole time, though Virgil suspects that was more to stop him from making a break for the door more than because Patton wants to stay hidden. And, much to Virgil’s shock, Patton is absolutely amazing at throwing snowballs and also dodging them.

“Isn’t this fun?” Patton says cheerily, ducking out of the way of a snowball Virgil knows would have decapitated him. “Here, make me some amo.” So, copying the movements Roman made earlier, Virgil begins to amass a pile of snowballs that Patton is throwing. It’s actually a pretty easy thing to do, and it is much more fun than the fear coursing through Virgil’s body every single time he emerges from behind the table.

After making a pile of snow so large that there’s not much left in his immediate vicinity, Virgil goes ahead and risks throwing a few. It’s not as fun as making them though, and they’ve been outside for days. It’s so cold that Virgil is shivering despite his uncomfortable winter coat.

Finally, the game is called. Virgil doesn’t know who won and won’t ask for fear of getting dragged into round two, and he drudges inside the theater with everybody else. Virgil tries to return the coat to Logan, who insists he keep it.

Patton, Joan, and Dahlia make hot chocolate for everyone and, within minutes, the place is full of lively chatter again. Virgil is still exhausted and shivering despite the coco in his hands. He doesn’t know how these people do it.

“So,” Logan asks, sitting on the stage next to Virgil, “how did you like your first snowball fight?”

Virgil blows on his steaming mug and watches Logan do the same. “It was terrifying. I think Patton almost got decapitated once.”

“I hope he’s not too attached to his head,” Logan comments, then groans. “Please do not tell Patton I just did that.” Virgil laughs, but doesn’t say anything one way or another. Maybe it can be his Get Out Of Jail Free card for the next weird culture thing they try to force him into.

“It was. . .fun,” Virgil grudgingly admits. And it was, though he’d never do it again. Somehow, someone managed to hit Virgil in the head with a snowball despite him being protected by the table and then Patton had laughed so hard he almost wet his pants.

“I’m glad,” Logan says. “It’s an annual thing.”

“Or biannual,” Patton adds, taking a seat next to Logan. He laughs while Logan groans at the horrible pun.

“Sometimes triannual.” That’s Roman, pulling himself up on Virgil’s other side. He drapes a jacket over Virgil’s shoulders and Virgil nods appreciatively.

“Or really, an every-time-it-snows-annual,” Remy says, walking behind Virgil and laughing at his shivering. “You get used to the cold, eventually.” He walks away sniggering as Virgil groans.

Virgil smiles and leans more into Roman’s side, listening to his friends’ voices float around him. He’s cold and shivering and he’s never really felt a need for hot chocolate like the one he feels right now, but he’s happy. He’s seen his first snow, had his first snowball fight, and worn a winter coat - though that was a lot less fun. It’s been a pretty good day, if he’s honest, and there’s a small, tiny, itty bitty chance that he won’t object if they decided to do something the next time it snows. He’d like to build a snowman, if the opportunity arose.

Maybe, he decides, snow isn’t so bad.

One week later, while Virgil is confined to bed rest because of his pneumonia, he swears up and down that he’s never going in the snow again.


End file.
